This Monday, November 29, they are more than 700 to have rushed to the Carré Belle-feuille, in Boulogne-Billancourt, to attend the last meeting of Valérie Pécresse before the Congress of Republicans. Facing the president of the Ile-de-France region, right-wing supporters occupy each chair in the Ile-de-France room. A few dozen people are even standing in the side aisles, masks on their noses, sheltered from the cold which fell at the start of the week in Paris and its suburbs.
A situation unthinkable just a few months ago, when the regional campaign was carried out with minimum gauges indoors and outdoors. But the fifth wave of Covid-19 and the threat of the Omicron variant are now knocking on the door of the presidential election. Thus, the first meeting of Valérie Pécresse, just invested by LR, will not take place “face to face” as planned, on Saturday December 11, due to the strong epidemic outbreak. For the time being, however, there is officially no question of reducing the authorized audience at meetings.
“Nothing is ruled out firmly and definitively, but as of right now it’s not on the top of the pile.”
A ministerial adviserto franceinfo
Of which act for the political formations, which connect today the small public meetings without physical distancing nor limit of attendance. “We are not going to be more royalist than the king on the instructions”, defends Pierre-Henri Dumont, deputy of Pas-de-Calais and close to Xavier Bertrand, eliminated in the first round in the race for the investiture of the right. “We are in expectation”, adds Boris Vallaud, spokesperson for Anne Hidalgo, while a health defense council is to be held on Monday, December 6.
Expectation, so it takes the form of full rooms with the mask for everyone inside, in theory. With a nuance, depending on the political personality supported: show or not your health pass at the entrance. The Republic on the move, The Republicans and even the Socialist Party are today asking for the precious sesame to authorize access to their events. Conversely, there were no checks of health passes at the entrance to the major meetings of Jean-Luc Mélenchon and Eric Zemmour, Sunday, December 5.
An artistic blur caused by a legal vacuum? Not really. On November 9, the Constitutional Council excluded political meetings from the scope of the health pass. It is thus possible to request, but not to require, the famous QR Code of an activist. “It is about defending the right of collective expression, which protects the right to assemble for political, trade union and religious activities”, explains Tania Racho, PhD in European law specializing in fundamental rights issues.
For political parties that have chosen to request the health pass, the stated goal is to reduce the risk of contamination during public meetings, sometimes extended in “glasses of friendship” or “republican banquets”. Threatened formats? “We were making militant pots, but we stopped because of the resumption of the epidemic”, regrets the entourage of Valérie Pécresse.
“Monday, for the last meeting, there was no pot, we had a pang in the heart.”
A relative of Valérie Pécresseto franceinfo
The specter of a cluster is never far away, as was the case after the congress of mayors of France, in mid-November in Paris, when a dozen elected officials from Cantal tested positive in Covid-19. Mayor or not, going to a political event represents a small risk that can put off, concedes Ian Brossat, campaign manager of Fabien Roussel, the Communist candidate.
“Before a banquet in Bordeaux last week, people canceled their participation, including people of a certain age, because these are mostly events where you can not keep the mask.”
Ian Brossat, campaign director for Fabien Rousselto franceinfo
In the weeks and months to come, isn’t the risk of facing a half-empty room, not because of the gauges, but because of the reluctance of the less fervent citizens? “We don’t know if people are going to be scared to come to public meetings”, wonders Boris Vallaud, member of the Landes, who sees an increase in the cancellations of meals of old people in his constituency, with the approach of the end of year celebrations.
Relegated to the second rank of concerns at the start of the school year, the Covid-19 returns to the front of the stage four months before the presidential election. “It can eat up the countryside a bit, predicted a member of the government. We held the Mutuality meeting on Monday because it had been organized for a long time, but I think it would have been canceled if it had taken place later. If the epidemic continues to rise, with reductions in gauges and the application of the health pass, it can be boring. “
The epidemic should also push the staffs to invest heavily in other lands, digital this time.
“You will have to refer to social networks, even if nothing beats a public meeting, a trip or door-to-door.”
Boris Vallaud, spokesperson for Anne Hidalgoto franceinfo
“The campaign is expected to change in the coming days”, anticipates Marine Tondelier, spokesperson for Yannick Jadot. Necessary adjustments that could penalize some of the seniors, less familiar with the Facebook, Twitter or Discord platforms. And perhaps generate a certain weariness among the youngest after nearly two years of playing politics from a distance. “Everyone does video meetings and webinars but at some point people are fed up”, adds the elected ecologist.
Failing to be able to galvanize activists on the internet, the candidates and their teams could find in the reinforcement of towing and door-to-door operations a back-up solution … more expensive. “Getting out more leaflets is going to be expensive, especially since the crisis has led to a rise in the price of raw materials and in particular paper”, fears Pierre-Henri Dumont, LR deputy who will participate in the campaign of Valérie Pécresse or Eric Ciotti. Likewise, if the gauges are restored, having to leave one in two chairs vacant, for example, automatically amounts to bringing together fewer spectators for a hall rental at the same price.
While they expect a very disturbed political sequence, the officials interviewed do not envisage a postponement of the poll to date. An earthquake, which is technically not impossible in fact. “It takes two weeks and a political consensus to postpone the presidential election, with Parliament meeting in Congress”, projects the constitutionalist Didier Maus.
Above all, the different parties do not really want the scenario of the second round of municipal elections, postponed three months to spring 2020, to happen again in 2022.
“That would amount to giving up the most structuring election in political life.”
Ian Brossat, campaign director for Fabien Rousselto franceinfo
“There are countries which have organized elections despite the Covid-19 and have succeeded”, assures Marine Tondelier, referring to the case of Germany or the United States. At the rendezvous of a capital election in the midst of an epidemic, can France get there in turn?